Santa Barbara moms running NYC marathon for charitable cause

SANTA BARBARA, Calif. — Five moms from Santa Barbara are training for the upcoming New York City Marathon.

Along with running 26.2 miles on November 7th during the 50th anniversary of the iconic event, these local ladies are also racing for a charitable cause. 

The group is representing Team World Vision, a charity raising awareness to provide clean drinking water for children in the developing world. 

“I am running for these moms, who are walking today,” Chrissie Velázquez said. “I am running alongside them and I’m running for child sponsorship.”

According to the nonprofit organization, many moms must walk over 3 miles every day to collect drinking water for their kids. 

Nearly 1,000 children under age 5 die every day from diarrhea caused by contaminated water, poor sanitation, and improper hygiene. Team World Vision believes that they can solve this global crisis by 2030. 

Thus far, the local group of ladies has raised more than $46,000 for the nonprofit.

“We’re doing this because it’s bigger than us,” Theresa Huerta said. “We can do this and we get to do this, there are so many people that don’t get to even walk.”

On Saturday, these moms completed a 20-mile training run that concluded at Butterfly Beach.

For three of the women, this was the longest that they had ever run in their life.

Each one of them hopes to sponsor 10 children apiece. 

To learn more or support them, you can click this link.